->''I'm the king of the world! Woo-hoo-hoooo!''-->--'''[=DiCaprio=] as Jack Dawson''' in ''Film/{{Titanic}}''

Leonardo Wilhelm [=DiCaprio=] (born 1974) is an American actor and film producer whose career rose with his role in the television sit-com ''Series/GrowingPains''. His critically acclaimed breakthrough film performance came in ''This Boy's Life'', and was quickly followed by ''Film/WhatsEatingGilbertGrape''. His performance as the mentally handicapped brother of JohnnyDepp, in the title role, brought him nominations for the Golden Globe and AcademyAward for Best Supporting Actor. He gained fame for his role as Jack Dawson in ''Film/{{Titanic}}'', and has starred in many other successful films including ''[[Film/WilliamShakespearesRomeoAndJuliet Romeo + Juliet]]'', ''Film/CatchMeIfYouCan'', ''BloodDiamond'' (which earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor), and ''Film/{{Inception}}''. [[MemeticMutation And he hasn't won an Oscar for any of them.]]

[=DiCaprio=] received another Academy Award nomination for his role as Howard Hughes in ''TheAviator'', directed by Creator/MartinScorsese. He has also worked with Scorsese in films such as ''GangsOfNewYork'', ''TheDeparted'', ''Film/ShutterIsland'' and ''Film/TheWolfOfWallStreet''. This partnership was compared to the earlier working relationship between Scorsese and RobertDeNiro.

----!!Tropes associated with:* AgeLift /PlayingGertrude: In Film/CatchMeIfYouCan he played 16-year-old Frank Abagnale. Two years later he was playing 40-year old Howard Hughes. A lot of people accuse the casting of being ambitious, to say the least.* AntiHero: Tends to play this type of character in most of his movies** ''Basketball Diaries'': A 14-year-old Catholic school student who is also a heroin-junkie and prostitute.** ''Total Eclipse'': Plays poet Arthur Rimbaud, who also had an affair with an older man.** ''Marvin's Room'': Sets his house on fire in the first 10 minutes of the show. Has bipolar disorder and stays in a psychiatric treatment center.** ''Don's Plum'' and ''Celebrity'': Plays spoiled, bored, rich [[JerkAss jerkasses]].** ''TheAviator'', ''Film/ShutterIsland'', ''Film/{{Inception}}'', ''Film/TheGreatGatsby'': Plays characters with [[spoiler: delusional behaviors and a warped sense of reality.]]** ''TheDeparted'': Plays a character who has to do some really shady things while undercover, such as participating in murder.** ''BloodDiamond'': Plays a [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain racist]] South African merc who kills and cheats his way across Africa for his personal gain.* [[invoked]][[AwardSnub Award Snubbed]]: He never won an Oscar. Mocking him for it is something of a running joke on the Internet.-->'''[[http://dlisted.com/2015/02/28/leonardo-dicaprio-is-really-coming-for-that-oscar/ Michael K.]]:''' Everyone jokes about how [=Leonardo DiCaprio=] is the Susan Lucci of the Oscars, and how he probably had his basement made up to look like the stage of the Dolby Theater so that when he’s feeling down he can pretend to accept an Academy Award while the 18-year-old models he’s going to fuck later sit naked in the audience. Leo is so hard up for Oscar that every now and again he makes [[TheCasanova one of his tricks-of-the-moment]] paint herself up like a gold Oscar statue before they get it on.* BigBad: In ''Film/TheManInTheIronMask'' and ''Film/DjangoUnchained''.* ChronicallyKilledActor: When taken to its logical extreme, if he appears in a Baz Luhrmann film his character is doomed (since he plays characters that die in the source material of the two Luhrmann films he's appeared in).* FakeNationality: French in ''Total Eclipse'' and ''The Man in the Iron Mask'' (which were cases of [[NotEvenBotheringWithTheAccent not even bothering with the accent]]); and Rhodesian in ''BloodDiamond''.* HeteroSexualLifePartners: With Creator/TobeyMaguire.* HurtingHero: Nowadays he seems to end up playing this type of character a lot.* KnightOfCerebus: A rare case of his characters in some films. Several of his characters add serious conflicts and drama to the plot (and that includes his nicest characters too), making the film becomes increasingly DarkerAndEdgier.* MeanCharacterNiceActor: Calvin Candie from ''Film/DjangoUnchained'' is regarded as the most evil character that LeonardoDiCaprio ever played. In fact, it got to the point that even Dicaprio felt uncomfortable with a role this time, and shows genuine disgust in the character.* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed:** Gets an {{Expy}} in the ''Franchise/ResidentEvil'' game series in the form of Steve Burnside; although the character's inclusion was most certainly pushed along by the advent of ''Titanic'' being popular, his personality and actions are modeled on [=DiCaprio=]'s earlier roles.** Gilbert (Gil) from ''Manga/HanaKimi'' is modeled after Leonardo [=DiCaprio=].** Wrestler Brian Kendrick went by the name Leonardo Spanky earlier in his career in Japan, due to his resemblance.* OldShame:** Any mention of ''Critters 3'' would most likely result in a dropkick.** He and Tobey Maguire sued to keep ''Don's Plum'' from being commercially shown in North America* OlderThanTheyLook: He looked 14 in ''Film/WhatsEatingGilbertGrape'' (real age 18), 16 in ''Total Eclipse'' and ''Basketball Diaries'' (real age 20), 16 in ''Romeo + Juliet'' (real age 21), 16 in ''Film/CatchMeIfYouCan'' (real age 28). Based on [[http://justjared.buzznet.com/photo-gallery/2518030/leonardo-dicaprio-j-edgar-filming-01/ recent set pictures from ''J. Edgar'']], the 36-year-old Leo looks right at home playing a 21-year-old Hoover. As one person put it, he looks about a decade younger clean-shaven.* PlayingAgainstType: ** Funnily enough, his role as carefree, charming Jack Dawson in ''Film/{{Titanic}}''. He usually plays tortured souls with either a heavy past or troubled personality. Ironically, Jack Dawson seems the closest character Leo has ever played that resembles his real personality off-screen or Arnie from ''Film/WhatsEatingGilbertGrape''.** In ''Film/DjangoUnchained'', he plays a sadistic slaveowner, and one of the main villains.** In ''TheWolfOfWallStreet'', he plays a hedonistic VillainProtagonist. Furthermore, it's his first comedy role (aside from his cameo in ''Celebrity'').* PrettyBoy: Played these characters early in his career.* PromotedFanboy: Often cites RobertDeNiro as one of his favorite actors, and co-starred with him in ''This Boy's Life'' (one of his first big breaks in film) and ''Marvin's Room''.* SexySoakedShirt: Remarkably common to whatever character he is playing. He got drenched in a tub in ''Film/WhatsEatingGilbertGrape'', falls into a pool in ''Film/WilliamShakespearesRomeoAndJuliet'', swims in the ocean in ''Film/TheBeach'' and ''Titanic'', along other examples.* SmokingIsCool: He smokes in almost all of his movies, starting from the ''Basketball Diaries'' (age 20). In particular, watch out for the scene in ''Romeo + Juliet'' in which he's sitting by the beach, calmly puffing away while he writes in his diary and droning RadioHead music plays in the background.* StarMakingRole: Jack Dawson in ''Titanic''* TypeCasting: DoubleSubverted. After his StarMakingRole in ''{{Titanic}}'', media pundits almost unanimously predicted that Leo would be another flash-in-the pan celebrity, typecast as a PrettyBoy [[TeenIdol teenage heart-throb]] before forever vanishing from the limelight after hitting 35. Unusually, he was GenreSavvy enough to move away from pretty boy roles into [[DarkerAndEdgier something grittier]] and started a very fruitful creative partnership with Creator/MartinScorsese. Ironically, this led [=DiCaprio=] to being typecast in crime and/or business dramas, Scorsese's signature genre, where he usually plays intense, morally ambiguous types. Leo's lead role in Christopher Nolan's sci-fi film ''{{Inception}}'' was seen as an attempt at broadening his acting range... right until it turned out he was playing an intense, morally ambiguous mind thief.* WhatMightHaveBeen:** Creator/QuentinTarantino wrote the part of Hans Landa in ''Film/InglouriousBasterds'' with Leonadro [=DiCaprio=] in mind, but later decided it was best given to a natural-born German with [[{{Omniglot}} the necessary language skills]].** He was originally supposed to voice Jack Frost in ''WesternAnimation/RiseOfTheGuardians'', which [[spoiler:would have been one hell of an ActorAllusion to Jack Dawson, as both Jacks drowned/froze to death in their movies.]]** [=DiCaprio=] was set to play serial killer Patrick Bateman in AmericanPsycho at the height of his Titanic teen idol fame, but backed out from the urging of his publicist, and to star in ''Literature/TheBeach''.----[[Film/{{Inception}} ''... We have to go deeper.'']]----